All Of Our Firsts
by lionheartilly
Summary: A series of drabbles based on firsts for Jerza. This series will a multi-chapter series with some stories involving 1-2 firsts in one chapter. Fluff, humor and angst abound! (rating M for future, suggestive scenarios)
1. First Meeting, First Smile

First Meeting and First Smile

We were so young, so small back then, and innocent. That much I do remember. My eyes were instantly drawn to that head full of beautiful, scarlet hair. We had maybe only been 8 or 9 years old. Still pups, still fresh on the road. The torture terrified us, the disappearing children made us fear for our lives to the point we did our best to make no mistakes, lest death claim us. Our small bodies marked with scars old and new too early in our lives.

We struggled and labored for ones so small, but we did our best. I stayed optimistic for the sake of everyone around me. My friends who would tremble and weep with fear and longing for home. I told them I'd protect them. Then one day, _she_ arrived. She wasn't with our group, but I sometimes ran into her while working. Every time I saw her, I wondered what her name was and where she came from. I could never seen a trace of a smile on her face.

All I saw was a quivering frown and fear in those large, chocolate colored eyes. Her appendages were covered with dirt, cuts and bruises. Her small hands littered with blisters, and my heart ached. I wasn't sure why, but it did. She was always in a different cell from us, with another group of children slaves, until one day... all of them but her disappeared and she was tossed in with us. Her hands with bleeding, broken open blisters amongst new ones were forming. I couldn't have that. I approached the girl who was crouching down in the corner now, her body shaking from head to toe. As I got closer, I noticed tears were rolling down her dirty face, leaving streaks of clean skin and my heart did that aching thing again. I wanted to comfort her.

"Hey," I said gently to her, lowering myself so I could be face to face with her. "You're bleeding. Let me see your hands." That red haired girl swallowed hard and looked back into my eyes with fear. "You can trust me," I told her softly. "I won't hurt you." I looked back over at my shoulder. "Grandpa Rob! Can you please grab me one of those shirts from that pile over there?" I pointed back toward a small pile of dirty, torn shirts that the guards had provided for us over the months. An older man had stood now and was gathering one up walking over to myself and the little redhead in front of me. "She hurt her hands pretty bad. I just want to help her wrap them up," I explained as he looked quizically at me.

"I understand," Grandpa Rob responded with a smile and handed me the dirty, tattered shirt. "You're such a kind boy, Jellal," I heard him murmur as he walked back over to where a group of my friends sat with him. I turned back to the redhead who was still crying. She was clenching her teeth and keeping her lips clamped down over them, as though doing her best not to burst into to tears loudly. I knew that feeling all too well and if the guards and slive drivers caught her, I knew all too well what would happen to her. "Don't let them see you cry," I whispered to her as I took the old shirt and ripped began ripping it.

The girl looked at me again, her expressions were certainly confused. Had nobody ever shown her any kindness here? "W-why are you being so nice to me?" she spoke in barely above a whisper, her small frame was still quivering and the first time I heard her speak, I could hear the tears in her tone, and that painful feeling in my chest came back. I realized then that I didn't want to see her cry anymore. I took one of her hands tenderly in my own and began wrapping it.

"I'm just helping a friend who's in need," I responded smiling. "Plus, I really don't like to see you so sad and frightened. I don't like to see you cry." The girl in front of me grew quiet as I worked. I wrapped both of her hands as well as the fresh cuts on her arms and legs, using the old shirt as a makeshift bandage. I noticed she had not once taken her eyes off of me. "I would love to see you smile. I'll bet you look really pretty when you smile."

The girl in front of me blushed, hard and I stood up on my feet and held my hand out for her bandaged one. "Come with me. I'll introduce you to Grandpa Rob and my friends." She slowly reached out and took my hand. Careful not to hurt her wounds, I took it gently and pulled her to feet. Her eyes were dried now, but I could see the tear tracks on her face where they had washed the dirt clean. Her cheeks were glowing a rosy pink color, and I smiled brightly at her. "I promise you, I will take care of you. I won't let anyone or anything hurt you anymore." I didn't know why, but I felt very protective of this girl. More so than anyone.

And finally. Her eyes widened and those lips that had been turned down into a frown just minutes ago, had been quivering with fear, turned up at the corners. I saw her smile. For the first time, and I remember that my own heart began pounding in my chest. I remember seeing her smile was like the entire room had lit up around me, and I wanted nothing more than to see all her tears and all her fears washed away. I always wanted to see her face light up and smile like that. To me, she was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Like the sun at the break of day. It was striking.

"That's the spirit!" I told her, giving her my own smile and tugging her gently toward my group of friends. Later, we all found out that her name was Erza, and I found I still couldn't stop thinking about that beautiful, red hair of hers. I was saddened to know she didn't have a last name, and so I gave her one of her own. And I remember, when I said we should call her Scarlet, how her eyes brightened and her face lit up in the most spectacular way, and she smiled that smile. Just for me.

And it was then that I knew, from our first meeting and that first smile, I was in love with her. Completely taken by this mysterious little girl with her beautiful red hair. Nothing has changed, even now. I have always been in love with her. To this very day, when I see her smile, it washes away the darkness that attempts to creep back into my world. Every time I see her smile, it's like seeing it for the first time all over again. It's like the sunrise all over again, and I fall for her, all over again.


	2. First Love

First Love

I'll never know why I started loving him as strongly as I do. Perhaps it was the moment he touched my hair and told me it was beautiful. Perhaps it was when he named me Scarlet. I remember my face burning, my cheeks flushing red, and I couldn't hide my smile. I remember the overwhelming, swooping sensation I could feel in my chest. Like my heart was wanting to jump right out of my throat, like it had swelled inside of me, and pounded so heavily that my whole body shook from the motion. I remember feeling like I was glowing.

I remember looking into his hazel eyes, so full of life and hope. His determination, his powerful sense of justice, everything about him floored me. The blue locks of hair that fell in his eyes, that prominent tattoo. I had always admired Jellal Fernandes from afar, but I think that was the day I truly fell in love with him. I had come to love him so much that when they took him away from us, I made an unwavering decision to find him and rescue him, the way he rescued me. I don't know if I would have survived that day they took my eye from me if he hadn't found me, but he gave me such a renewed feeling to continue living and to fight. Fight for our freedom.

When he was taken away from us, and something inside of him dramatically changed him into pure, unadulterated evil, and yet I still loved him. That's why I cried so much when he banished me from the Tower and threatened the lives of our friends. Even though that wasn't my Jellal, I still loved him, and I still wanted to save him. I knew he could be saved, but the price of my freedom was steep. It was something I couldn't afford and something the others did not deserve, and so I fled, forever locking away the feelings in my heart for him.

I never stopped loving him, even when I saw him again in the Tower after all of those years. It still stirred something up inside of me. To fight him was agonizing, and to watch him fight Natsu was even more so, but if anyone could help free him, it would have been Natsu. And when I saw him again during Nirvana, after he was revived, believing him to be dead all that time, my emotions were so conflicted. I had no idea what to even feel or to expect. And when I saw him shed tears of remorse and sorrow for his past, and when I almost lost him to a self-destruction spell he had placed on himself, my conviction did not waver. I still wanted to save him, because I love him.

When I saw him fight so desperately to protect me, even when his magic energy was spent, when I pulled him back again from stepping another toe into the brink of darkness, and when I protected him, it was because I knew that I still loved him. When I saw him taken away from me yet again, believing that I'd never see him again, watching his back moving further and further away from me, cuffs around his wrist preventing him from using magic.

Jellal Fernandes, battered, broken, torn, but still alive, yet no memory of his dark past, was being carted off to prison. I thought my heart was going to shatter into pieces. When he remembered the color of my hair and remembered me just as he was saying his goodbye and to be carted off to prison, I loved him more than I ever had before. If only I had told him then. He knew I cared for him deeply, but back then, I don't think he understood the extent of my love for him.

During my battle on Tenrou Island with Azuma, it was him that revitalized me. It was the sound of his voice that brought me back to my feet. It was him calling out to me that made me get up and want to fight again. I love him so much that just hearing his voice was enough to give me the strength I needed to stand. I still don't fully understand that myself, how I heard his voice, but I know I did.

It was just like after the incident at the Tower, and how I heard his voice call out to me, telling me I'd grown strong. His voice had encouraged me to never give up, to stand on my two feet. I remember the overwhelming emotion and strength I felt surging through the very core of my body, like a burst of energy that had been waiting to fulfill me on the inside out. It was his voice that did that for me, because of how much I love him.

Seven years. I had no idea that I had slept in a stasis for seven years. It had felt like only moments when I fully awakened on Tenrou Island. Like Acnologia had just attacked us. I remember feeling a strange sort of sensation that I cannot explain surge through my exhausted body, and it felt so much like him. Like his presence was right there with me. It was only for that moment, but again, my love for him brought me to my feet and it guided me home, back to Fairy Tail.

I remember Bisca and Alzack finding me, and bringing up Jellal to me. The moment I heard his name, I was so terrified that my worst fears had come true, and that he had died in prison during those seven years. I was relieved to find out that after a year in prison, Ultear had broken him out and he was alive and on the run, but my heart sank and my mind wandered. Where could he even be right now? How could I track him down? Did he still think of me, even after all those years have passed? Was I still a thought to him? Because my feelings never changed, even though I had been in a time stasis for all those years.

When I saw him again, on the beach, I had to control myself and my feelings in front of my guild. I could not waver, but oh how I wanted to run to him and wrap my arms around him, and listen to the beating of his heart, and feel his warmth. I needed that confirmation that he was really alive and in front of me, not fake or an illusion. I craved that, but I held myself back, for the sake of my dignity and his. I didn't even know if he truly felt anything at all for me anymore, the way he did when we were young.

After all, all of those years had passed between us, perhaps he truly had moved on, even though I hadn't. We walked off together, so we could talk alone and privately amongst each other. Especially after he confirmed to me that every single bit of his memory had returned. We stood on that ledge together, just above the beach, and I had so many questions... so much I wanted to ask him, but my mouth couldn't seem to form the words properly. So instead, I asked him of Simon and Nirvana.

Seeing him so filled with remorse turned my heart over in my chest, but hearing him declare he wanted to die and wanted me to be the one to kill him, is what filled me with anger and fear for his life. I was desperate to try and keep him alive, so I did the only thing I could do. I slapped him. Maybe that was the wrong course of action to take with him, but I wanted to snap him back to his senses, into his right mind, because I don't think I could handle it again if I lost him. Twice now, I had believed him to be dead. I couldn't go through that torment again. He had to stay alive.

This wasn't the Jellal I remembered as a child. He stared at me, with a difference in his expression, a haunting pain clouding his eyes, and I felt an awful pang in my chest. This Jellal was ready to give up, regardless of his cause, of his guild, of everything he'd done to try and gain his redemption. In my eyes, he already had. Prison time and now all that he was doing, Jellal had more than earned forgiveness, because, in truth, it was not him who committed those atrocities in the Tower. It was Ultear, controlling him, using his body as her puppet, making him harm and kill and do horrible things that the real Jellal would never have done. I understood that, but what I couldn't understand was Jellal's desperation to die despite knowing the truth.

In a desperate attempt to bring him back to his senses, I had grabbed him by the collar of his hooded coat and we lost our balance. We tumbled down a hill, holding onto each other before we landed in a heap at the bottom of the hill in front of the ocean. Jellal had landed on top of me, and I lay completely helpless under him. My angry front vanished, and I listened to the rolling baritone of his voice as he commented on how I was always right. But I was never right. I explained to him that I just stumbled through life as best I could, no matter how clumsy I was. It didn't matter. I just wanted him to understand exactly how important he was to me, how much I loved him, and how I couldn't bear to lose him again.

And then, my emotions betrayed me. As I stared into his eyes, so sincere, so honest and soft, my own filled with burning tears, and I could no longer hold them back. I truly thought I'd never see him again. I thought he would've been gone forever, locked away in the confines of prison in the Magical Council's headquarters, or worse... but he wasn't. He was right there, looking down at me, his body resting on mine, with the most gentle, and loving expression I had ever seen on his face, and I couldn't help myself. I placed my hands on the sides of his face because he still made me feel the same way all those years ago. He raised his hands and brushed away my tears with this thumbs.

He did still love me, even after all this time. I knew he did. I could read it all over his expression. All of my memories of him flashed before my eyes. I saw him when we were children, remembered when he touched my hair, when he fell to darkness, when I saw him again in the tower, when I saw him as Seigrain, when I saw him cry, when I saw him fall, when as he said goodbye he remembered me because of the color of my hair... and it was right there, just as his lips tenderly placed themselves against my own, that I knew he was my first love and would forever be my only love.


End file.
